Life is Cheap, Bittersweet
by Echante
Summary: I'm in love with Meredith." He tells you, you only shrug and smirk. Addison/Derek


Wow I'm on a roll today. I actually rather like this one, if my thoughts are in sync with what came out... I haven't read it yet. I'm scared to... Anyway, this hit me while reading another fic... Don't know why... Please review!

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**Life is Cheap, Bittersweet**

_Deep in my mind; I'm secure with getting by; want to see the light before I die; Before I lie in an empty space_

"I'm in love with Meredith." He tells you.

You shrug and smirk. Obviously it's not the reaction he expected but you're very thankful for the hours of rehearsal that you put in, imagining him saying these very words, picturing them sliding from his mouth. It's every moment you've feared and dreaded since he came back to you, and every inherent part of your recurring nightmares. You figured indifference would be the only defense you had in this moment.

"Tell me something I don't know," you say, rather painfully, but he doesn't know.

When he doesn't move you grin predatorily at him and ask, "Why are you still here?"

He takes one confused look at you and then sulks out of the room.

When the door shuts, you fall to the floor, sobbing.

The problem is, when he comes back an hour later, you'd been too busy hyperventilating to hear him come in, and for the first time in years, he sees you at your worst, lying on the floor, vulnerable.

"Addy?" He asks concerned and you tense. Turning away you wipe off your tears and stumble, mumbling, "I have to pee."

You lock him outside the bathroom door panicked; this way not something you had anticipated. You hadn't thought that he would come home. You'd simply thought that the day he cared enough about you to stop lying to you, would be the day you set him free. The freed don't usually fly back. They soar away from their tormentors.

You wipe the tears from your cheeks and wander back outside, dreading what was going to happen. "So." You say, trying to sound casual, failing miserably as intermittent sobs hiccup their way into your throat, "was she not home?"

He looks confused, "Who?"

You stare at him, amazed at his audacity, did he really think you would forget your conversation just an hour earlier?

"Meredith."

His lips thin in recognition, "You didn't let me finish earlier."

"What were you going to say?" You sigh, wincing.

"I was going to say, that I'm still in love with Meredith." He interrupts you before you can interject your own sarcastic comment into the mix, "But you're still in love with Mark, and we're still completely fucked up, and we're never going to work in Seattle."

"So what are you saying?"

"I wasn't sure exactly, but I was thinking… We should take a break, move away from all of this shit, stop being 'Addison and Derek' the surgeons and start being 'AddyandDer' husband and wife."

You blink blankly at him because he just proposed quitting his job. Silently you wander outside, drenching yourself in the shower of sprinkles and allowing the bitterness of the weather to hit you full-impact.

He follows you outside. "Addy?" he questions, his voice is slightly scared.

You stare ahead at the 'vacantness' in front of you.

"Addy?" He asks again.

Finally you speak, "Tell me really Derek, was that what you were going to say?"

"No." he admits sheepishly, and you can tell he is a little awed at how well you could read him.

"Where'd you go when you left?"

"I took a drive."

"Why?"

"Because I was going to say, that I was still in-love with Meredith, but that I still respect our marriage, as hard as that is to believe, I was going to ask for some more time."

"Where'd the second half come from?"

He turns you around and says the answer to your eyes, "Because," he says, "When I saw you laying on the floor, sobbing, broken… I knew, I knew that a lifetime with Meredith would never be better than repairing you… repairing the broken you to the Addison I once knew. She made me happier than anyone else ever could."

"What about who I am now?"

"You are who Mark and I made you." He says, "It's not your fault…" he hesitates, "I was absent."

"Yeah." You breathe incredulously.

"I chose surgery over you too many times."

Confusion dilates your pupils yet again.

"I'm sorry." He finishes with, and then he hesitates and sweeps the hair from your face, the rain causing it to frizz and stick awkwardly to your back. And then, in between shivers, he hesitates and brings his mouth to cover yours, slowly and with askance, and then deeper but gentle. He's finally afraid to break you.

"Derek?" You ask when you pull apart.

"Mhmm." He says, tracing circles on your jaw.

"No more rain."

He nods and agrees, "No more rain. Addy, and we should probably leave the country too."

You nod vigorously, "Bahamas?"

"Or like… Australia."

"Too many bugs."

"Bahamas it is then."

"To the Bahamas."


End file.
